How to build table-top fusion reactors

Sep 10th 2025|Seattle|4 min read

There is a widespread misapprehension that controlling nuclear fusion is hard. In fact so long as you are not hoping to use the process to produce electricity, controlling fusion is easy. Indeed, it is possible to build a fusion reactor on a bench top. The details were worked out in 1964 by Philo Farnsworth, better known as the inventor of electronic television. The basic design is so simple that Farnsworth fusors, as they are known, can be built by hobbyists. Even their inventor, though, could not coax them into generating power.